Determined to Protect, Forbidden to Love

by Beverly Barton

  “What is his name?”

  “Claude Dupont.”

  To Rory’s astonishment, Sebastian lifted a telephone and spoke to the driver. “Stop the car. Now!”

  CLAUDE DUPONT. Marielle’s brother. Laurent felt ill as the name wormed through him like a fatal poison.

  Claude had been on the yacht the night Marielle had overdosed. Had he taken it upon himself to avenge his sister’s suicide by attacking the women Laurent showed an interest in? Or was someone trying to pin Rory’s murder on Dupont?

  Laurent took the sales receipt from Rory’s hand and squeezed her chilled fingers. Gott sei Dank! Thank God she had escaped harm this morning at the beach. He would never forgive himself if he lost her. His princess was becoming far more precious to him than he knew was wise.

  The rear door opened and Heinrich joined them on the facing seat. “Ja?” he asked Laurent.

  Laurent explained what had happened and showed Heinrich the sales receipt with Dupont’s signature on it. If Heinrich immediately recognized the name, he was too professional to give any indication of that in front of Princess Charlotte Aurora.

  “These books you mention. This Dupont touched them?”

  “Yes,” Rory said. “We put them aside in case he returns to the store for them.”

  Heinrich nodded. “Gut. His fingerprints will be on these books. We can ask the police to compare them to the fingerprints they found on the fence after the incident last night.”

  “The police?” Rory rounded on Laurent. Her voice rose. “You called the police and they found fingerprints? And you didn’t tell me?”

  “It was not your concern. You have more important matters requiring your attention.”

  “Someone is trying to kill me and you don’t think I want to know that some evidence was found? I’m not a Barbie doll who can’t think for herself. Granted, leaving the house this morning without protection was not the smartest decision I’ve ever made, but I’m the one who brought you this receipt. I want to be kept informed.”

  “You are not a Barbie doll, madame. I apologize if I led you to believe that I considered your position or namental in nature. I’m afraid that threats to a member of a royal family are commonplace. Heinrich is working with the police to handle the matter as expediently as possible and to see that the perpetrator is identified and apprehended. Prince Olivier was informed immediately.”

  “Well, that makes it all better—you told my brother! How patriarchal!” Her blue eyes narrowed dangerously. “I think I need to have a talk with my brother, but I’m not finished with you.”

  Laurent’s lips thinned. He did not need to defend his decisions to anyone except his father, the king.

  Rory waggled a slender finger in front of his nose. “What happens on my property, to me, is my concern. This man killed my mother. I want to help.”

  He stared down his nose at her finger. His mother, in all her life, had never dared raise a finger or speak in such a manner to his father. “Your mother would wish to see you protected.” He captured her finger. “As do I.”

  She gasped, her eyes widening as a frisson of awareness spontaneously combusted between them at his touch. She jerked her finger away, her eyes glittering with the brilliant fire of sapphires. “I’m not a child. I can protect myself.”

  Laurent dropped his hand to his thigh, his fingers clenched. She was not being reasonable. “You are made of flesh and blood. You could die and I would never be able to live with myself,” he said far more harshly than he meant, his patience at an end. He was reminded that her mother with her romantic ideals of equality and love had not lasted more than two years in the Estairian court.

  Even though his own mother had foolishly loved his father and had suffered from his unfaithfulness, she’d at least fulfilled her duty.

  But because he feared Rory might do something ill-advised like go off again without her bodyguards, he added, “I will refrain from going into specific details, but there have been two other incidents involving women whom Prince Laurent has seen socially.”

  Rory paled. “What? This has happened before?”

  “It is difficult to determine if these events are related or coincidence. But one woman died under suspicious circumstances. Her last name was Dupont.”

  “Oh, my God!”

  “We are not leaping to conclusions,” Laurent reminded her. “We are going to let the experts handle the matter.”

  Heinrich nodded vigorously. “If I may, sir. If this credit card is legitimate, it may tell us a great deal about this Claude Dupont and where we can find him.”

  Rory frowned. “What do you mean if it’s legitimate?”

  “It could be a fake or a stolen identity,” Heinrich explained. “Someone could be setting up Dupont.

  “If I could obtain a picture of Claude Dupont, Your Serene Highness, could you assist me in showing it to the surfers who were at the beach this morning?”

  “Of course.”

  “Gut. With your permission, then, I will accompany you to your place of work tomorrow to pick up these books and request the police run any prints they find through Interpol.” Heinrich carefully removed a glass from the minibar and instructed Rory to grip it with her right hand so the police would be able to identify any fingerprints that might be hers. He preserved the glass in a motion-sickness bag, then repeated the procedure with Rory’s left hand.

  They were almost at the hotel. As the limo pulled up at the rear entrance, Laurent met Rory’s defiant gaze and realized worriedly that his princess would not bow to his every command. He found her independent nature both a source of consternation and admiration. “Heinrich has suggested that you receive some immediate instruction in self-defense training. Are you amenable to that?”

  “Of course,” she said indignantly.

  “Then you will begin tomorrow.”

  Laurent’s chest tightened as he waited for the all-clear signal that it was safe to depart the vehicle. His fingers protectively circled Rory’s elbow as he hustled her out of the limo and into the hotel. He saw the concentration in his princess’s beautiful face as she struggled to walk with dignity in those shoes. Somehow he felt events were moving far beyond his control.

  ODETTE DISCREETLY ENTERED the salon of Prince Laurent’s suite and found him standing at the window, gazing out at the bay, his back to her. Only one lamp illuminated the salon, casting a puddle of light on the desk where he rigorously attended to his royal duties.

  She hesitated to disturb him when he was seeking a moment of solitude from his work. He was stripped to the waist, a snifter of brandy clasped in his elegant fingers.

  She trembled, her heart tightening with suppressed fury at the pale bandages gleaming against his bronzed skin. Twice in one week they had almost lost him—all because of this American princess.

  She wondered if he was thinking of her now. Odette knew her prince well. Knew that even though he fought it, he desired Princess Charlotte Aurora. Perhaps was even falling in love with her. Tonight, when he’d arrived to escort her to dinner, he’d looked at her as if she were the only woman in the room. Odette had only once before seen Laurent behave like this—with Marielle.

  And he’d been oblivious then, too, to the ways that women schemed. His precious Marielle had plotted behind his back. Just as Princess Charlotte Aurora schemed now.

  Odette knew where her loyalty lay. With Laurent. “Am I intruding, Königliche Hoheit, Your Royal Highness?”

  She saw the fatigue and the worry etched in his handsome features as he faced her. He took his duties so seriously. She knew sometimes that he could not sleep and spent lonely hours deep in thought or with his books.

  “Not at all,” he said. “I assume this concerns Princess Charlotte Aurora’s wardrobe?” He held up a hand. “She will learn best from her own mistakes.”

  Odette smiled softly. He possessed all the qualities of a great king: wisdom, compassion, strength. “Nein, that is not what brings me here. But I will hold your philosophy in min
d.” She stepped farther into the richly furnished room. Prince Laurent set down his snifter of brandy and reached for his black silk dressing robe, draped over the back of the desk chair.

  “Bitte, don’t trouble yourself,” she bade him. “I know the stitches in your back pain you. We are alone.”

  “Danke.” He left the robe on the back of the chair.

  “The Princess asked me today if I could give her a picture of you. I was not sure how to respond.”

  His noble brow furrowed. “How did you reply?”

  “I told her that I would see what I could do.”

  “She is curious. If her curiosity is satisfied she will concentrate more on her lessons. Give her a photo of my brother Leopold.”

  “You’re sure? If I may speak freely, she does not strike me as a woman who appreciates dishonesty.”

  She felt a prick of alarm when his shoulders stiffened. Had she gone too far in questioning his judgment? The lines furrowed deeper in the corners of his mouth, and his jaw set with false conviction. “She will understand my reasons. She is not ready to meet her fiancé face-to-face.”

  “As you wish.” Odette wished him good-night and left him to his solitude. Men were such fools.

  RENALD JERKED AWAKE at the sound of Odette Schoenfeldt’s voice on the sensitive listening device. He checked his watch. What was she doing in Prince Laurent’s private rooms at one o’clock in the morning? Was the playboy prince sleeping with his press secretary?

  Renald thought that little suspicion might well come in handy. He noted the date and the hour. Leaked to the right tabloids, this information could fuel a rat’s nest of allegations that might make Princess Charlotte Aurora and Prince Olivier reconsider the wisdom of this marriage.

  CLAUDE DUPONT was a desperate man on a mission. It was 3:00 a.m., and the shops of La Jolla Cove were darkened, the streets deserted beneath a crescent moon dangling high in the star-studded sky.

  The ocean, obscured by the shops, rumbled and sighed as his deck shoes slapped on the pavement.

  He had tried to make contact with Princess Charlotte Aurora three times now. Tried to save her from Prince Laurent. But there had been no mention in the media of a man being shot or fatally wounded on Neptune Place.

  He’d missed his opportunity and nearly got caught. He’d failed Marielle again. Just as he’d failed to listen to his sister that night on the yacht. He’d been too preoccupied with finding a girl to share his bed, and he’d seen Marielle go off with a girlfriend. She’d had a shoulder to cry on. He’d thought she would be okay.

  Remorse weighed on his chest and shoulders. For three years he’d wished he could relive that night.

  He reached the door to the Book Nook and slid an envelope into the brass mail slot.

  This had to work. He couldn’t allow the marriage to take place.

  RORY WENT TO BED angry and couldn’t sleep. Her dinner with her brother was strained. Like Sebastian, her brother, Olivier, seemed to be living in the Dark Ages and actually thought he had a right to make decisions for her. He’d given her a brotherly kiss and suggested they learn to understand each other’s ways.

  “One is not right and the other wrong, ma petite soeur. They are just different.” Then he’d explained that according to the laws of Estaire, she must seek his permission in writing to take on public duties, to marry, to divorce and to resign all rights to the succession of the throne.

  Rory tossed and turned over the injustice of it until Bronteë mewled with concern and hobbled over the sheets to nest herself against Rory’s stomach. She buried her fingers into her pet’s silken fur. “Sorry to bother you, girl.”

  Brontë grumbled throatily as if saying, “Pet me and I’ll forgive you.”

  Rory debated finding a pen and paper and resigning her claim to succession of the throne of Estaire right now. Her mother had been murdered and someone was trying to kill her. Sebastian had as much as told her that even if the police caught her mother’s killer, there would always be other threats. What kind of life was that?

  It was the life she would have known if her parents hadn’t separated, she thought miserably. She’d have been raised with the responsibility of knowing she might one day rule Estaire. Or be expected to make a sacrifice for her country by making a politically strategic marriage.

  Rory hugged Brontë, feeling more pressure than she’d ever known.

  RORY HAD EXPECTED Heinrich to accompany her to work in the morning, but not Sebastian. Funny, how she could be annoyed as hell with him and still find him drop-dead gorgeous. He wore a perfectly tailored black suit that fit him like a delectable coating of dark chocolate. His shirt was a dazzling white and his burgundy-and-black silk tie was a power statement.

  He looked hot. Hard and composed, not a care evident in his aristocratic features as he greeted her cordially. She wanted to pull him into the shower, suit and all.

  After her sleepless night, she wasn’t in the mood to be reminded that her feelings for Sebastian were inappropriate. He was Prince Laurent’s deputy secretary. She groaned inwardly as the rich timbre of his voice bewitched every hormone in her body with a desire to run her fingers through his thick dark hair.

  She’d done her best to apply her makeup as she’d been instructed yesterday, but her eyes looked puffy and she wasn’t satisfied with the results. At least Pierce and Alice had reorganized the kitchen cupboards yesterday and found her vitamins. She’d dutifully eaten the breakfast Alice had prepared, even though she wasn’t hungry, and swallowed a vitamin.

  How could Sebastian behave as if nothing was wrong? She felt as if she had just lost her new best friend. At least Heinrich had encouraging news to share, though his expression was guarded. Rory assumed there was a rule against smiling on duty.

  “Dupont’s credit card seems to be legitimate, and the police are checking with hotels in the area. I have been promised a copy of his passport photo today or tomorrow at the latest.”

  As the bodyguard preceded them to the limo, Rory whispered pointedly to Sebastian, “I’m glad someone around here is respecting my desire to be treated like an equal.”

  Sebastian speared her with a harsh look that jolted her to her soul. He opened his mouth to say something, then snapped it shut, a muscle flexing visibly in his jaw.

  She wanted to apologize. Deep in her heart she knew he was being a gentleman and pretending that nothing awkward had happened between them. But she was hurt and confused and she’d wanted to rumple him. She’d never met a man who’d affected her this way.

  A strained silence stretched between them in the car. She wanted to tell him about her mother’s letters to her father and somehow regain that same level of intimacy they’d shared last night before he’d kissed her and called her his Lorelei, but she knew it wouldn’t be wise.

  She would follow his example and maintain a cordial distance between them. Maybe if she could convince him to show her a picture of Prince Laurent, she could replace Sebastian’s face and body with the image of the man she was destined to marry.

  When the limo pulled up outside the Book Nook, Rory hoped that Sebastian would stay in the car, but he stepped out onto the curb as if the world were at his command.

  She sighed and dug her keys out of her purse.

  She unlocked the door. The bell jingled merrily as she shoved the door open. She bent down to pick up a large manila envelope on the floor.

  Rory flipped the envelope over, expecting to see a postage stamp. Someone had printed with a black marker: “For Your Info.” That was odd. Rory hit the light switch, flooding the shop with light.

  “Where are the books?” Heinrich asked.

  “There, right behind the counter.”

  Sebastian followed Heinrich, his hands clasped behind him as he paused to peer more closely at a book display.

  Rory smiled. You could always tell a book lover. She slid a finger underneath the gummed flap and tore open the envelope. It contained newspaper clippings. For a moment she thought of Otto Gascon. He
was always bringing in book reviews.

  But these weren’t book reviews. Rory’s heart froze as she looked at the top clipping and saw the photograph. Sebastian’s handsome face was captured in profile—each aristocratic line edged with light, his gaze hooded as he lifted the hand of a beautiful brunette to his lips. The brunette smiled demurely up at him as if she had a secret, her almond-shaped eyes clearly adoring.

  The headline read: Crown Prince Implicated in Lover’s Death.

  Rory forced her gaze to the caption beneath the photograph. Her frozen heart thunked to her toes and broke. The couple in the photograph were identified as Prince Laurent of Ducharme and Marielle Dupont.

  Her fingers crumpled the clippings as she swallowed the bitter truth. Sebastian wasn’t the deputy secretary. He was her prince.

  And he’d lied to her.

  Chapter Eleven

  Rory trembled with shock.

  Discovering that Sebastian was the prince she was destined to marry should have been wonderful news. She was halfway in love with him and she knew that he desired her.

  But he had deliberately misrepresented himself and not told her who he was. And he had been in love with Marielle Dupont.

  Rory ignored the shard of pain that had lodged in her breast at the first sight of the headline. Maybe there was a reasonable explanation for Sebastian/Laurent’s actions.

  She scanned the opening paragraphs of the article:

  Weeks after shipping heiress Marielle Dupont, 25, was found dead on her family’s yacht after consuming an overdose of the drug popularly known as Ecstasy, authorities are still closemouthed about what role Crown Prince Laurent of Ducharme may have played in his lover’s death.

  The couple had been dating three years, leading gossip rags to speculate that a royal marriage might be in the offing for Ducharme’s playboy prince. Rumors abound that Prince Laurent supplied Ms. Dupont with the drugs. Witnesses attending the party on the yacht the night Marielle Dupont died claim that the couple had been involved in a lover’s spat earlier in the evening and Prince Laurent left suddenly. One witness, who requested her name be withheld, suggested Marielle Dupont had committed suicide because she’d learned the prince was seeing another woman.